I guess this is legal. I mean, it's a legitimate sidewalk. So how come there's no one doing this? I pass maybe a dozen people crossing, and they're all joggers, bikers, or maintenance guys. Am I the only person in the world commuting this way?
Well, there's those shuttle buses that go across the bridge every couple minutes. That's probably where everyone is. It's only a buck.
Of course, I'm just cheap enough to walk half an hour rather than pay a dollar.
Whip it! A-whip it goud!
And this whole commute thing is about being cheap. I'm taking the PATH from Jersey City to 33rd St. in Manhattan. That's $1.00. Then I get the A train up to 175th St. That's $1.50. Then I walk across the bridge, free, and I'm at work.
I could take the bus. But there's no direct route, all the indirect routes run with the frequency of pirate radio, and the cheapest I can find takes close to two hours and costs $2.55 up, $2.80 back.
My current way costs $2.50 each way, and every part of it's guaranteed to be there. Damn bus put me off in some industrial park in Union City last time.
Thirty cents saved every afternoon, five cents every morning.
So I'm walking across this bridge to save a nickel. Yeah, this is me.
Well, it is exercise. I can feel it in my legs.
I love the A Train. Blows right through from 59th St. to 125th. That's 66 blocks in five minutes. You can't move anywhere in Manhattan faster than that.
Ca-rack that whip!
Geez, why do I have Devo in my head? When was the last time I heard Devo?
When I'm taking the train I can read a book, and when I'm in the car I'm listening to the radio, but here, I got nothing to read and nothing to listen to. So my mind's just wandering. The spastic albatross of my train of thought.
Hey, a quarter! No, just a rivet.
Every time I pass I maintenance guy, I wonder if he's going to say something about my not being allowed up here. With so few people, you'd think so. But never a problem. It's not illegal, just stupid.
It's a nice skyline and all from this viewpoint, but hell, it's all crowded a couple miles to the right. When I had to walk through Manhattan blocks, at least there was stuff all over the place. This is just the same giant cables over and over.
I guess this is my luck. I have a job I hate, doing something I don't like, and my car's finer than fine. But as soon as I get a job related to my diploma, something I want to do, that pays better and has more prestige, my car takes that trip to car heaven. Assuming my car was Christian, and lived a decent moral car life.
Good, solid bridge here. Roebling steel. I was in the Roebling factory down in Trenton. Hasn't been used in a while. They're trying to turn it into a museum, but that's a good five years down the line.
OK, what is that yellow gunk at the side of the bridge? It stretches for pretty much the entire thing. Is it caulk? It is some mold or fungus that grows on the bridge? Is it poop from dog walkers who just kick it over the edge rather than pick it up with a baggie?
Long way down from here. Gotta be at least a hundred feet. One slip, and my funeral's going to be arranged by Spatula City.
Would there be any way to survive a fall from here? Maybe if you had your feet pointed straight down, and cut right in the water, you'd be able to just get most of your spine powdered.
With the blowing sometimes, that information might come in handy. It was 45 miles per hour one day. My bag almost got blown out of my hand. It blew a tree down on someone that day. And there I was walking across a little ribbon of steel over the wind tunnel.
You know, if I had a dog, I'd kick it over the edge. Not the dog, just the by-products. Nothing the Hudson River hasn't seen before.
When a bubbling comes along, you must whip it! When a bubbling comes along, you must whip it!
I'm positive those aren't the real words. What the hell's a bubbling?
Another quarter! No, just another rivet.
I've only walked on the south side of this sidewalk. There's a north side, but it's been closed for a year and a half for maintenance.
This is probably the better side to walk on; it's got a closer view of all the buildings. The north side just lets you look at the Tappan Zee Bridge and the Bronx. Big whoop.
"Well Nigel, quite a day for a sail. I do so enjoy taking the yacht out on the Hudson ... oh my God, it's raining feces! Get below deck, Nigel!"
Heh heh heh. Poop is funny.
My car's about as reliable as a hundred year old's bladder.
Let me see what's happened so far. My old car died, a month after getting smashed up. So that's how I found this route to work.
I borrowed Dad's car for a couple days when he was away on business, so I got to drive to work again. Then I went back to the walking.
Then I found a new car, so I drove to work again. But one stinking day before it decided to stop running.
A tow from my parking spot later, and it's fixed, so I drive it again. And it stalls so much, I try to drive it back to the mechanics after two days. It doesn't make it, so another tow.
Fixed again. This time hopefully for good. (Thank God the mechanic's not charging us for this fixing stuff.) No more stalling, just a regular car. But then the transmission starts going all funny, not enough to stall the car, but enough to notice. So I have so little faith in my car that I just leave it in the parking spot and do the walking thing until I can get it back to the mechanic's. Assuming it'll make it there without a third tow.
You know, I'm getting tired going through this whole car thing. I'm getting tired telling people about my car. I'm getting tired even thinking about my car. I'm looking for one damn thing: motion. Is that quite so hard? I mean, every single one of the cars on this bridge has motion, quick motion at that? You'd think I could find a car like that.
I was hoping just once traffic would be really backed up, so I could officially claim that I was moving quicker than the speed of traffic. To bad the jam's always at the tollbooth coming in, and never on the he bridge itself.
One good tractor trailer jackknife, and that'll stop up all traffic, and then I'll be there. Of course, one good tractor trailer jackknife, and I could be thwapped off this bridge like a second grader hitting a T-ball.
"Oh God, Nigel, it's raining assistant editors now! Much worse than the feces! Get the Lysol!"
Jeez, wanna kill me with that bicycle?! You'd think they'd shout something or make a noise before whizzing by like that. If I decided to stick my arm out for no reason, we'd both be in a heap.
I wish I wasn't sweating so much once I get off this thing. It's either sitting in the 175th Station stating with my coat on, or it's trying to look office casual at my desk while rivers of sweat overflow from my eyebrows. I go from losing all my body heat from the wind up here to blazing in 78 degree inside.
That's probably why there's showers in gyms.
How much sweat do eyebrows hold? Mine's gotta me more than your average eyebrow. Could be a good half ounce or so.
I should be disturbed that the maintenance work here is just covering all the rust over with more silver paint. I should, but I'm not. Something like this collapsing or breaking or anything is just inconceivable.
You know, I haven't been able to drive to work a single week? It's always been driving a few days, and then something happened with the car du jour, and I walk across here the rest of the week.
Hey, almost to the end.
I wonder if you can walk on the lower part of this. There's no sidewalk, I know, but could you just hop from support to support and make it across that way?
If terrorists took over the bridge, and I had to get a message to the other side, I might have to do that.
Geez, most every extrapolation in my head involves terrorists taking over something and me doing the whole Die Hard routine.
You know, an airplane could fly through one of those giant loops, get its wings ripped off, and the fuselage would just go barreling down the center of the bridge. That'd be kinda cool.
Well, not the hundreds of people dying. Just the plane, losing its wings. Crashing like that. Big fireballs everywhere.
Then maybe I'd have to hop across the lower level of here. To escape the fireballs. Yeah, that could work.
Quarter!...rivet.
Jeez, that's like catnip to me. "Sean Ryan was found killed by a large boulder this morning. Police reports say he stopped his running across the desert after seeing a slight glimmer in the road next to a sign that said "Free Quarter". An undetermined canine variety then pushed the rock on him, accordion-folding his rib cage.
Well, maybe when the car gets fixed this time, it'll stay fixed. Probably not, but maybe it'll last for a week this time. Probably not. Can I get five days? Four? Three and a half? A weekend?
I wish I had a jet pack.
A-whip it goud!